Positivity is in the air as Boro get first win under their belt

WITHOUT being at their best, Middlesbrough picked up an opening-day victory over Swansea City to get the Rob Edwards era off to a great start.

- By CRAIG JOHNS

Dael Fry's second-half header was all that separated the two teams at the Riverside, in what was a tight encounter between two sides whose defences largely cancelled one another out.

Despite that, Boro managed to find the moment to record back-to-back opening day wins over the South Wales outfit.

Including the game-changing moment, the positive, negative and main thing we learned, here is the match debrief after Boro's 1-0 victory.

THE GOAL 51 MINS

Boro 1-0, Fry Another Boro goal from a set-piece, carrying on an encouraging record from preseason. Fry makes a great near-post dash and flicks home a header from Morgan Whittaker’s delivery naturally so pivotal in earning them the points.

THE GAME-CHANGING MOMENT

In a game of such fine margins, Boro’s goal is naturally that moment that changed this game. Alan Sheehan, the Swans boss, described it as a 0-0 game, and it’s easy to understand why. Neither goalkeeper had too much to do. With that in mind, Boro's goal was

It's a goal you can trace all the way back to the first summer friendly against Mansfield, when Fry got the first of two goals in the summer friendlies before Saturday's against Swansea.